Love
Sculpture were a Welsh blues-rock band of the late 1960s, led
by Dave Edmunds (born David Edmunds, 15 April 1944, Cardiff, Glamorgan,
South Wales), plus bassist John Williams - stage name John David (born
John David Williams, 19 January 1946, Cardiff, South Wales) and drummer
Rob 'Congo' Jones (born Robert Jones, 13 August 1946, Barry, Glamorgan,
South Wales).

Career

Love Sculpture formed in Cardiff in 1966 out of the remnants of
another local band called The Human Beans, and disbanded in 1970,
although Edmunds went on to enjoy solo success in the 1970s. The band
itself was essentially a showpiece for Edmunds' considerable technical
ability on the guitar. Love Sculpture mostly performed blues standards,
slightly revved-up, but still largely reverent to the originals,
releasing their debut album, Blues Helping with such songs as
"Summertime", "Wang Dang Doodle" etc. They are best known for their 1968
novelty hit in the UK Singles Chart, a high speed cover version of the
classical piece "Sabre Dance", by Aram Khachaturian, released on the
Parlophone label (R 5744). The recording was inspired by Keith Emerson's
classical rearrangements. "Sabre Dance" became a hit after garnering the
enthusiastic attention of British DJ John Peel[3]. In December 1968, the
UK music magazine, NME, reported that Love Sculpture had signed a U.S.
recording contract with London Records, guaranteeing £250,000. The band
were also given an invitation to perform "Sabre Dance" live, on the
German Beat-Club television program of Radio Bremen, being broadcast in
monochrome at that time.

This was followed by a second album Forms and Feelings, with songs
including: "In The Land of the Few", "Farandole", "People People",
"Seagull (West Coast Oil Tragedy)", written by Paul Korda, and the
equally fast cover of Chuck Berry's "You
Can't Catch Me". The U.S. version of the album also featured a recording
of "Mars" from Gustav Holst's The Planets, but Holst's estate refused to
license the tune for the U.K. version.

They recorded three times for BBC Radio 1's John Peel sessions in
1968 (twice) and 1969.

In 1970 Mickey Gee joined the band as a second guitarist, and Terry
Williams replaced Rob Jones on drums.

Love Sculpture split up after a U.S. tour, having recorded two
albums. Edmunds shortly went on to further number one hit success with
"I Hear You Knocking", and collaborated heavily with ex-Brinsley Schwarz
bassist Nick Lowe, eventually forming the band Rockpile with him.